Summary Of The Poem By Mealdez

When Meléndez is describing the whole route of the butterfly and what it does within the community, the structure of the poem becomes much more spread out and divided between lines. The sentences become longer and are split between multiple stanzas rather than just one, showing more time spent on his thoughts. The presence of this butterfly in his neighborhood becomes impactful to the author as he watches it’s every move and the reach people are using to try and get to it. The reason the butterfly seems to be out of place is “because of all his beautiful colors”. The idea of color is usually associated with aspects of feeling and with color being something unidentified and thus, a stranger to the community, there is a lack of different colors within the
community which could relate to the idea of despair. The flaws in Meléndez’s paradise are becoming apparent as the butterfly comes on to the scene. He then describes how kids were reaching for it as if it were hope, love, or a lost dream. With these direct associations being made to the butterfly, he is saying these qualities are strangers to the community.
These serve as the last aspects of identity he places on the community, highlighting the fact that within all of them, he really is trying to make himself believe of “el barrio” as a paradise so he can embrace it fully. However, there are still certain things he is reminded of there being a lack of and thus, he finds it hard to overcome them. As a result, the line in which the word “away” is by itself draws attention to the fact these aspects leaving through the butterfly are very impactful towards the author. But the most impact comes when the butterfly manages to fall down into the sewer and as a result, “now he was part of us”. This realization causes the author to cry because he sees how coming into this community causes all of the things associated with the butterfly, love, hope, dreams, and colors, to die out after pridefully roaming the streets and buildings. Structurally, this line is farther from the rest because it takes him to allow himself to come to this realization, seeing it as something he didn’t want to have associate with the reality as a slash is present right before the
line. Along with that, the lack of humoristic tone throughout these last 6 stanzas shows the gravity of this event and the serious nature of the realization in contrast to everything else. In all, Meléndez goes through a lot in the process of coming to terms with what his home truly is and how that identity is developed in certain events that take place within “el barrio”. Although it seems to him as a paradise at first, he slowly realizes the impact the community has on those that try to have hope, love and dreams through the appearance of the butterfly. It is difficult to say whether in the future he would be able to come to terms with these conditions and apply his humoristic tone onto an event similar to this. But at least within this moment, it is clear that the butterfly and the meaning it holds will remain as a barrier in the defining of home as paradise for Meléndez as can be seen with the poem’s structure and tone at the end. This is very likely the case for many others within similar living conditions, thus making this poem a voice of many within “el barrio” that want to make the most out of what they have but have difficulty doing so.